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Could advanced pharmaceutical research be hurt by Obama's Budget Plan?

Stock prices for major drugmakers fell sharply Thursday as investors were apparently worried about provisions of President Obama's budget proposal that could significantly reduce profits across the pharmaceutical sector.

Drug companies and their trade groups have opposed such a prospect even more strongly, claiming that it would reduce the money they have available to fund research to develop new medicines.

So, which would you prefer advanced pharmaceutical research or lower drug costs?Do you think the Government should even be involved in pharmaceutical companies business?

I don't think we have a choice. Obama will get his way...socailized medicine. The market is tanking thanks to all his brilliant ideas in finance, housing, pharma.

Answer by
Anonymous
at 2:07 PM on Mar. 2, 2009

Big Pharma is full of crap. They spend much more on marketing than R&D. I think we should take pharmaceutical commercials off the air. If you go to your doctor asking for a certain drug, doesn't that just make him your dealer? Then they could spend that money on R&D and let the doctors do their jobs.

and isn't a part of a doctor's job, to SOMETIMES help you with the aid of a pharmaceutical prescription? How will a doctor know what to prescribe if there are no drugs to write scripts for? How does the industry stay competitive and new discoveries made (often a drug used for one purpose ends up having a better alternative use), if docs were to just dispense aspirin, acetaminophen, or ibuprofen all the time?

Answer by
Anonymous
at 2:28 PM on Mar. 2, 2009

if docs were to just dispense aspirin, acetaminophen, or ibuprofen all the time?

LOL. Anon, have you ever been to a military hospital? The "joke" from when I went was that they give you horse pill sized Motrin (800 mg, I think) and send you on your merry way. LOL.. I would rather have advanced medical Rx with my healthcare than limited "rationed" nationalized beaurocratically determined treatment.

Of course it is their job, I never said we should ban rx drugs or not allow docs to prescribe them. We should allow docs to do their job by examining their patients and determining which of the many treatment possibilities are available would best suit that patient. Big Pharma has more marketing than commercials, they also have reps who go to the docs offices, give free samples and educate on the drugs, what they do and what they are used for. They also buy the offices lunch and send docs on vacations to encourage them to prescribe their drugs. Docs also have to have a certain number of continuing medical education units annually to keep their license and most spend plenty of time researching as new info comes out.